


take a moment to assess the sins you've paid for

by nokomisfics



Series: cost you to keep me quiet [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: ???? - Freeform, AU, Alternate Universe, Canon diversion, Eventual Smut, M/M, Model, Model!Sherlock, Modelling, PWP, Photographer!John, Plot What Plot, Porn Without Plot, Smut, it's nice lol, model trope, modelling au, my first smutty fic, please R&R hehehhhh, plot lol what's that, poorly written AU with impeccably written smut, shy!John
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-24
Updated: 2014-10-24
Packaged: 2018-02-22 10:47:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2505065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nokomisfics/pseuds/nokomisfics
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Because John Watson had never before met a man who could be turned on by himself. (Or the one in which Sherlock Holmes turns Sherlock Holmes on.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	take a moment to assess the sins you've paid for

**Author's Note:**

> this fic was born when I had the following conversation with myself --  
> Me: what does Sherlock think when he looks into the mirror?  
> Me: I'd do me.
> 
> not beta'd. it's just smut, man. have fun :D

There were things he could get used to if he did them often enough, and things he would never get used to no matter how often he did them. John Watson was aware of this. Unfortunately, being aware of it wasn’t the same as conquering it, so when he reached out a fist to knock on the black door labelled 221B, his fist still shook, and he still winced at his own inadequacy.

The door was opened by a dotty old lady with a high-pitched voice, who waved him up at the stairs and punctuated each of her phrases with an endearment. Mother? Unlikely. Landlady, then. She introduced herself to him as he disappeared up the stairs, but that - along with the decor and the weather and the cab ride here - flew under his pre-job radar.

The door to the apartment was open. He knocked regardless. "Come in," called the voice of a lazy man, from the sounds of it. John tried to keep himself from frowning, knowing that Holmes was the best deal he could hope to bag this early in his career. Gritting his teeth, he walked in.

The place wasn’t as messy as he first expected it to be, although it looked like its keeper had tried exceptionally hard to clean-up for him. Speaking of the keeper, a man with very ( _very_ ) long legs was sprawled out on the couch, with his head of messy black hair lolling off the edge and three different cameras lying on his stomach.

John cleared his throat. "Um. Hello. Mr. Holmes?"

"Sherlock will do," said that same lazy voice, although the man's lips barely moved. His eyes flew open and ran skilfully over John's person, and John experienced the sensation of being stripped bare without being touched at all. Then the man was on his feet, all three cameras in hand.

"You can abandon your equipment," commanded he. "We'll be using mine for this session."

John raised his eyebrows, cleared his throat and shook his head the slightest bit to the left; all this in a moment, and in that same moment Holmes managed to conjure up a stand onto which he attached the camera of his choice, flinging the other two onto the couch and making John wince.

"Yes," said John, trying to re-insert himself into the scene. "Of course. Where is the studio?"

"We will be using," proclaimed Holmes loudly, "My room." Picking up the camera and stand, he strode off to the right.

John tried not to show his surprise to Holmes, but he was sure he failed spectacularly at that. This certainly wasn’t his first job, so he knew how unheard of it was for clients to have studios in their rooms. Unless it wasn’t a studio. Upon entering the room that Holmes had strode into, John quickly learned that his assumption was accurate.

There was a white sheet hanging from the curtain rod, illuminated by the sunlight hitting it from behind, and a soft blue carpet on the floor in front of it. This was, John concluded, the infamous studio.

"I can't work like this," he said immediately.

"Don't be silly," called Holmes, who was now standing on a bed that seemed to have been pushed hastily to the wall to make way for the blue carpet. The rest of the room was bare. "You can't turn me down. You need the money."

The man had distinctive features: grey-green eyes with eyebrows that curved mischievously, and pale lips that were currently shaped into a smirk. John found himself staring at the high cheekbones. "What makes you think I need the money?" he asked, setting his work bag down by his feet but not making to unzip it. 

"Your appearance. Among other things."

This time, John let himself frown. "That's awfully shallow of you. Perhaps I _choose_ to not dress in designer - "

"No," cut in Holmes, before executing a rather spectacular eye roll. "Yesterday's shirt. Pants and shoes that belong to a relative. You're unshaven, your hair is oily." The man stepped down from his bed and approached him confidently. "Bags under your eyes and an uncomfortable crick in your back making it look like you're limping when you're not. The making of Carpal's tunnel in your wrist and," at this, Holmes was close enough to sniff him, and sniff him he did. "Ah, yes. Cheap cologne in lieu of a morning shower. You don't live the easy life, John Watson."

John didn't reply, but his lips were parted, and he was sure the soft breath that escaped from between them spoke enough about how surprised he really was by that. Holmes went to stand in front of the white sheet, barefoot on the carpet. He raised his eyebrows smartly at John, and waited.

It occurred to John right there that he could leave. Get his agent to set him up with a client who wasn't this big a dick. But he had to admit that that was impressive - Holmes had had just five, six minutes to accumulate all of that? - and he was curious as to how good he really was at what he claimed to do.

So he didn’t say anything. He just dislodged Holmes' camera from the stand and took it in his hands. Then he lifted it to his eyes, and began fiddling with the focus.

Holmes was patient while John set up, stepping out of his way while the sheet was adjusted to let in just the right amount of light, and the lights of the room were adjusted to compensate. Holmes was dressed in a dark blue button-down shirt that stretched across his lean chest, and long self-patterned black trousers that didn't pronounce his legs as well as skinny jeans would have done. But John supposed Holmes wasn't one for skinny jeans, so he let it go.

When he was ready, John looked up to see Holmes standing in the centre of the carpet, arms wrapped around his chest and his head angled towards the window. The faded sunlight bounced off his cheek and faded into the black curls of his head, making the man look surreal. Gulping, John cleared his throat, resisting the urge to take a candid right there and then. Of course Holmes would be so bloody photogenic.

 "Ready?" asked Holmes, returning his attention to John, and when the latter raised the camera, the former transformed into a photographer's wet dream.

Holmes was compliant in every sense of the word. He held his body like a professional, but bent it according to John's will, and the looks he gave John each time he raised his camera left the photographer wondering. But he let it pass, and tried keeping the snaps he took up to his standards, while being simultaneously conscious of the fact that any recognition he'd receive for this job he would redirect back to Holmes.

For an hour or two, the room was filled with the clicking of the camera, and the soft sounds Holmes made when John repositioned him. At the end of the two hour mark, John stopped with the full-body shots and stepped onto the carpet to take close-ups.

"Look at the sheet," said John, and he didn't mean for it to sound commanding but Holmes didn’t seem like he minded it too much. The man angled his head at the sheet, and John set about trying to recapture the candid he had passed up on earlier.

He quickly realised what he was doing wrong. "Can I just," he wiped his palm on his trousers, then approached Holmes and swept his palm through the man's curly hair, messing it up a great deal. For the first time, Holmes winced. John tried to hold back a chuckle. "It's for the shot," he said. "You look good when it's messy." Holmes didn’t reply, so John stepped back and raised his camera again.

That was when it began, John supposed. First Holmes' head was angled at the sheet, then he slowly turned it back to the camera, and then raised his eyes to John and fixed him with the sort of look that went straight south. John ran his tongue over his lips and continued clicking, trying to explain this behaviour as something Holmes just thought was required.

Then the man reached up to undo his collar button, and John still went with the flow. He struggled to appear unfazed when Holmes undid the next two buttons, and then casually pulled his shirt out of his trousers, and then slipped his palm into the pocket of his trousers and turned back to the sheet, his lean body forming a striking outline in the fading sunlight.

"Um," said John, at a loss for words. "Holmes?"

"Sherlock," corrected the man, and looked over his shoulder at John. "Why'd you stop?"

 _Because this is not what I signed up for_. "I was under the impression this was a..." But the man raised his eyebrows then, and fixed him with a look so smouldering it made John question everything he had previously believed true of himself. And he thought, for the first time in a while, _fuck it_.

The same two words ran through his head when Holmes, making a thoroughly frustrated sound from his sinfully plush lips, undid the rest of his shirt buttons and slipped out of his shirt completely, tossing the bunched up material onto his bed. He was still facing the sheet, but the lean muscles of his back that didn’t quite flex but didn’t quite go unnoticed either made John gulp. Hard.

When Holmes rotated ninety degrees to look at the far wall, the bulge in his pants was remarkably _there_ , and John almost lost it. No, he almost lost it when Holmes ran his palm down his stomach, and gripped at the bulge hungrily. No. He very nearly lost it when Holmes' hands circled his own neck, squeezing it slightly.

Or when he moaned. Throaty, loud, lustful. John's fingers shook. He didn't think he could carry on. He _was almost completely gone._

Thankfully for him, Holmes had other plans.

The man held out his palm expectantly, teeth grazing his bottom lip and the expression on his face inexplicably eager. "The camera?" stuttered John. He nodded. John stepped forward and handed it over, watching as he evidently pulled up the last few pictures John had taken, and skipped through them one by one.

Then he stopped scrolling, palm scratching the back of his neck and pulling at his hair simultaneously. Holmes looked up at John, his eyes dark and his plush lips parted. "You can leave now," he said, but the bulge in his pants was still _there_ , and John was sure he was sporting one to match. And there were a million moments prior to this one in which John should have left, but Jesus bloody Christ this was not one of them.

Never before, thought John as he grabbed Holmes' shoulders and pulled him in for a bruising, claiming, soulfully stripping kiss, had he encountered a man who could be turned on by himself.

And he'd be damned if he wasn't going to fuck him senseless tonight.

**Author's Note:**

> find me on tumblr at fuckyeahpotterlockfanfic.tumblr.com :D


End file.
